Chapter 429: Three Steps to Rule Shu
That night, we stayed in Mianzhu City.

Out of vigilance and habit, black bears like to stay in high places such as city walls.

However, it was not beautiful after all, so a three-story pavilion was quickly built in the Yuanzhou government office in Mianzhu City.

The third-floor pavilion is covered with finely woven straw mats, which are as thick as a thumb and very comfortable to walk on barefoot.

Originally, the North and Central Plains should have had this kind of straw mat weaving technique; but the war lasted too long and these craftsmen had already starved to death.

In the middle of the attic was a square fire wall. When Black Bear arrived, he saw several secretaries who had entered the city earlier were lighting a fire by the fireplace, and on the table next to them were some copied official documents.

Seeing Black Bear coming in, the secretaries stood up and put down their teacups: "Your Majesty."

"Well, please do as you please."

Black Bear waved his hand and went into the compartment inside, which served as his small study and dormitory.

Behind him, Dian Wei was holding two exquisitely carved wooden cabinets that contained various slips of paper, like treasure chests.

The secretaries looked at the wooden cabinets that Dian Wei was carrying on both sides, and only looked away when Dian Wei followed him into the small study.

The spare candles in the small study were lit one by one and covered with gauze.

Black Bear took off his turban and outer robe, sat down half a step away from the fireplace, and began to rummage through two wooden cabinets.

He took out the notes related to Shuzhong from the small drawers and placed them neatly on the table.

From the beginning to the end, he never thought of conquering Shuzhong in one go.

Including the four surrounding barbarians, after taking over Yizhou, the direct and indirect population can reach five million.

If you are not careful, you will become the host of the parasite.

The problem of parasitism already exists and is unavoidable; but we cannot allow the big families in Shu to become the hosts.

If you want to preserve the vitality of Shuzhong as much as possible, you must restrain the use of the military.

The army is the most brutal, and even three months of rigorous training only strengthens their military literacy and their initial respect for military discipline.

If one-tenth of the people don't die during training, and if we don't train for two to three years and start with culture and spiritual civilization, we can't expect to train a civilized army with strict military discipline and moral bottom line.

Given the prosperity of Chengdu, once the army is sent out, it will be difficult to bring it back.

If a starving dog is mad, you will smash its head but it will still hold on to the steak tightly.

If one wants to deal with the big families in Yizhou relatively peacefully, one can only kill with a borrowed knife.

The conflict between the Dongzhou scholars and the native Yizhou scholars is irreconcilable. They are familiar with each other and are involved with each other. When they take action, they will not go to extremes, nor will they provoke a full-scale resistance from the big families in Shu.

It's not that he was afraid of these people launching an all-out rebellion, but he was afraid that when these people launched an all-out rebellion, his army would be sent out and the prosperity of Shu would be destroyed along with it.

If the problem can be solved by using prison guards and clerks, even if Fa Zheng only gives himself half, that is acceptable.

Preserving the prosperity of Shuzhong is more important than anything else.

Therefore, next, we must first remove the so-called famous generals and veteran generals in Yizhou and temporarily exempt these people from their military power. In the future, the big families in Shu will have less confidence to unite and rebel, and they will lack the courage to launch a rebellion, making it difficult to launch the rebellion.

There must be a suitable excuse, which should not give the other party a reason to refuse or a window of opportunity to accumulate resistance.

Looking at the pages of paper on the table, Black Bear's eyes fell on Pang Xi.

Currently, Pang Xi is the strongest one in the Dongzhou military system, because Pang Xi has always been outside Chengdu and maintains a great degree of autonomy.

As for Liu Mao and Wu Kuang, if he were not around, with Wu Kuang dying of old age and Liu Mao retiring, this power would fall into the hands of Wu Yi.

In the Dongzhou military system, since Jingzhou has not yet encountered a major chaos, there has not been a phenomenon of tens of thousands of Jingzhou people fleeing to Shuzhong, and many Jingzhou scholars are still staying in the province.

Liu Zhang was from Jiangxia, and his ancestral home was Jingling on the banks of the Han River.

The scholars of Jingzhou fled to Shu to avoid the chaos. This force was naturally an ally of Liu Zhang and would strengthen Liu Zhang's rule over Yizhou.

Without this group of scholars from Jingzhou, Liu Zhang's control over Shuzhong still came from the power of balancing local and foreign forces. Therefore, there was a lack of trust from top to bottom, and he fought quickly. Seeing that the situation was not right, Liu Zhang fled, and the rest surrendered.

If you want to govern Shu for a long time, you have to grasp the scale... But I am not in the local area, and I don’t have 20,000 or 30,000 troops to suppress it, so no matter who comes, it will be difficult to grasp this scale.

The locals wanted more, and even when the country was unified, the imperial court had to give up many interests.

However, my foundation here is too shallow and there is no room to accommodate the big families in Yizhou.

It's not that I'm petty, but the strength of the big families in Yizhou is too strong. Not to mention their disciples and former officials, the children of their fellow villagers alone are a huge manpower.

Many famous families in Guanlong and Central Plains have become empty shells, but they still have disciples and former officials all over the country who can be used, as well as disciples and former officials of their disciples and former officials.

It is conceivable how great a shock it would have been if people like Zhang Song and Qin Mi were allowed to hold high positions in the shogunate.

These people really need people and money, and they have abundant resources; the key is that the Shu people are very united when they go outside and are allies by nature.

Therefore, after gathering the military power of the generals in Shu, the next step was to have Fa Zheng gather the scholars of Dongzhou and bring their friends in Shu to avenge grievances and revenges. While eliminating some of the big families and powerful people in Shu, they could also destroy the internal unity of the Shu people.

The third step was to divide Bashu. Not only would Hanzhong be ceded, but a state would also be established outside Yizhou.

This state cannot be named Bazhou, because the word Bashu has historical connotations and can encourage local separatist sentiments, just like Jingzhou is Jingzhou, not Chuzhou.

The third step cannot be rushed. We need a reliable candidate who is free and can implement the division of Bashu when there are no external incidents.

As for the fourth step, it involves the South Central region, and I will have to come there in person when the time comes.

If you go to Nanzhong yourself, capturing and releasing a Han hero like Meng Huo seven times is a good idea.

By using the influence of people like Meng Huo, we could lure out the forces in the deep mountains and forests one by one, beat them all up, and then appease them with kind words, and the matter would be settled.

Black Bear thought about it and suddenly felt that people like Meng Huo were very important. There is also a classic image of this type of people... Shen Gongbao.

On certain levels, people like Meng Huo have made indescribable contributions.

Perhaps we can find suitable candidates through Li Feng and Fa Zheng and start training early.

If 'Meng Huo' is useless, he will let this 'fair and righteous man' he has trained stand up and lead the barbarians in the south to fight against him.

Thinking of this strategy, Black Bear immediately took a pen and wrote on a new piece of paper.

After recording, open the drawer "Nanzhong Planning" on the "southwest" side of the wooden cabinet and put the note in it.

Along with the plan, there are also people and products in South China.

After he calmed down, he began to sort out the notes on the table. Now it depended on how Pang Xi would respond.

If you hand over your military power honestly, I will deal with the next person.

If they raise an army to resist, we can remotely control the Hanzhong and Ba soldiers to confront Pang Xi and attract more rebels to jump out.

Just stay in Mianzhu and beat anyone who jumps out nearby.

If Pang Xi intended to use the cup-breaking technique as a signal, then he could immediately summon all the generals from Shu to Mianzhu.

As he pondered, Black Bear pulled out the "Chengdu Products" drawer, which contained not only the roughly estimated output of minerals, farmland, silk, etc., but also population data.

There are many proletarian refugees near Chengdu, which is a common problem in big cities. We cannot give the rebels in Shuzhong the opportunity to coerce and arm these people.

As far as the prosperity of Shu is concerned, sometimes annexing too many people would actually increase the burden.

A population lacking advanced skills could be a negative asset for the wealthy and powerful families in Shu.

We must immediately increase manpower investment in the reconstruction of the plank road and mobilize and hire more civilians.

We must not allow the big families and powerful people the opportunity to encourage the reorganization of negative assets into fighting power.

(End of this chapter)